


april fools

by iron_spider



Series: holidays [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, Peter is a Little Shit, Tony Has Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-06-27
Packaged: 2019-05-29 05:18:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15065981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iron_spider/pseuds/iron_spider
Summary: Tony doesn’t eat jello. He’s never liked it, not even as a kid. But lemon jello? What kind of goddamn shit? He is insulted. This is an insult.He takes out his phone and dials Peter’s number.Once again, one ring. The kid is lying in wait.“Mr. Stark, I’m trying to learn.”“You put the new Iron Man helmet in jello,” Tony states, deadpan.“What? I’m in school.”“Peter.”“How would I—you’re crazy, someone’s messing with you.”





	april fools

The paper slides out of the fax machine and Tony sighs. He’s lost count of what number this is. It is number Too Many. 

His own stationery, dated April 1st 2047. He yanks it out, squinting down at it.

_Tony. This is Tony from the future. Do not eat any of the food from the fridge. It’s all compromised. More to come._

_TS_

He sighs. He grabs his phone and dials Peter’s number. 

Peter picks up after one ring. “Hey, Mr. Stark!” Too cheerful.

“Hey kid, I’m not an idiot.”

“Are you sure?”

Tony narrows his eyes. “Mostly annoyed you’re wasting paper. I didn’t think you knew what a fax machine was.”

“What are you talking about?”

Tony sighs again, leaning on his desk. “C’mon, Pete.”

“Mr. Stark, I’m in class, I don’t—what’s this about a fax machine?”

Another piece of paper comes sliding out and Tony watches it like an intruder, feeling very put-upon. He yanks it out and peers down at it, sighing so heavily that it rattles into the receiver.

_Tony. This is Tony from the future. I am trying to save you. There is a stink bomb in your downstairs bathroom. If you make it in time to solve the riddle, you can stop it from going off. Godspeed._

_TS_

“Peter,” Tony says, brows furrowed, worry growing in his heart and a headache taking hold in his skull. “This is bullshit, right?”

“What is?” Peter asks.

Tony grits his teeth. “Stop trying to sound innocent. You are not innocent. Future Tony Stark has sent me more than twenty goddamn faxes and it’s April Fool’s Day and you’re a little shit.”

“Oh man, future Tony Stark? That sounds serious.”

“Is there really a stink bomb in this house, Parker?”

“Mr. Stark, I don’t know. You should go find out.”

“After all—I have done for you,” Tony says, leaning against his desk and shaking his head. “The lengths…to which I have gone.”

“I haven’t done one single thing wrong,” Peter says. “It sounds like—something monumental is happening. Contact. From the future.”

“I’m hanging up on you,” Tony says, and presses the end call button just as Peter starts laughing. Tony puts his phone down and another fax comes through. He holds out for a couple seconds, doesn’t move—this is bullshit, a minor irritation, but Peter knows just how to drive him insane. He cracks his jaw and grabs the paper, crumpling the corner as he holds it up to read.

_Tony. It’s Tony again. You need to take Peter Parker out of school. He is in severe danger, and if you don’t take him out it will change the entire outlook of the future of the world._

_TS_

Tony rolls his eyes, and puts the fax with the ever-growing stack. “Oh, he’s in danger alright.” 

~

Tony stares. He feels insulted. He doesn’t understand how the universe or FRIDAY or Pepper or anybody on this goddamn compound allowed this to happen. He keeps staring. He crosses his arms over his chest and knows his face is gonna stick this way if he keeps frowning so drastically, but he can’t help himself. 

He doesn’t eat jello. He’s never liked it, not even as a kid. But lemon jello? What kind of goddamn shit? He is insulted. This is an insult. 

He takes out his phone and dials Peter’s number.

Once again, one ring. The kid is lying in wait.

“Mr. Stark, I’m trying to learn.”

“You put the new Iron Man helmet in jello,” Tony states, deadpan.

“What? I’m in school.”

“Peter.”

“How would I—you’re crazy, someone’s messing with you.”

“Yeah, _you._ ” Tony sighs, looking at the helmet. It’s from the suit he and Peter were working on in the lab together last night, and it feels like an _et tu, Brute?_ moment if there ever was one. They’d laughed. They’d shared stories. Tony let Peter have a swig of his beer. If their lives were a fucking movie about family and love and fathers and sons, building that suit together would be in a fucking montage. And now the helmet is quivering in a mold of lemon jello.

Lemon. Of all things.

“What have you done?” Tony asks, deadly quiet.

“Well, right now I’m doing an experiment about atoms—”

“You’re the worst person that’s ever—you know what?” Tony stops, his hand mid-wave. He tries to relax his face. He averts his eyes from the jello. He fixes them on a point on the far wall that doesn’t enrage him as much. “This doesn’t affect me. It’s fine. I’m an adult, it’s fine.”

“I’m sorry someone is harassing you, Mr. Stark,” Peter says, and he sounds so sincere that Tony scowls.

“Goodbye,” Tony says, and hangs up again. He tosses his phone onto the table and sighs, preparing to sink his hands into the jello.

~

“Tony!” Pepper’s voice calls, her clicking heels signaling her approach. “Tony! What the hell are you doing, what’s that noise—oh—oh my God.”

He’s flanked on all sides by balloons. Surrounded. The entire living room is packed with them like fucking sardines or pickles or some shit. Some of them are floating, some of them are attached to the ceiling, some of them are attached to each other. A lot of them are filled with unpleasant surprises. It’s impossible to cross the goddam room, there are so many, and he’s only gotten to the middle by popping them as he goes along. He’s already got red and gold glitter all over him from the first couple he’s popped, and his arm is covered with flour from the last one. His face is stuck in a perpetual grimace. He didn’t know this many balloons could exist. It’s like the celebration at a presidential convention except he’s not the president of anything but Peter Parker Haters Club.

He was stupid enough to have left his goddamn laptop in here last night. He never could have known. He doesn’t even want it anymore. He can’t even goddamn _find it._ Or the couch.

He has to up the security. He has to take Peter’s name off of everything. He has to make him public enemy number one. 

He pops another balloon and rice scatters to the living room floor.

“How—how—”

“A small spider,” Tony says. 

“Peter did this? Did he tell you that?”

“No,” Tony says, turning to look at her. But he can’t fucking see her because there are bulbous, pastel balloons surrounding him, shadowed with whatever horrors they contain. “He hasn’t owned up to anything that’s happened today but I know it’s his scrawny ass behind it all. I’m disowning him.”

Pepper snorts. 

“No,” Tony says, pointing in what he thinks is her general direction. “Don’t. This isn’t funny.”

“It’s sorta funny.”

“It’s not.”

“It’s actually…impressive,” she says. “Is the whole room like this?”

“I’ve made some progress,” Tony says, a balloon under his foot whining when he moves too fast. “But now I’m—”

“Progress? Wait—how did you get into the middle?”

“I got trapped!” he grunts. “Jesus, it’s like a minefield, I was popping some and others started popping and there’s glitter—”

“How did he even get in here?”

“Don’t—I don’t know, but somebody’s getting fired. I need to hire a new squad, Happy’s wanted a suit, well he’s getting one—”

“What is this?” Pepper asks, and Tony can see the outline of her bending down. “Sprinkles?”

“Probably,” Tony says, popping another balloon and getting a shot of glitter to the face. “He’s a terrible, terrible kid. The worst.”

“You love him.”

“No. I never have. I especially don’t now.” Every movement is a squeak. 

“You have to admit a little pride in this,” she says. 

“Yeah, no,” Tony says. He tries to take a step and accidentally pops one, startling himself. His frustration reaches peak levels and he starts hurling his arms around, making stupid rubbery noises and squeaking and Pepper’s laughter is added to the chorus, too. Mocking laughter. 

“Okay,” she says, as he keeps thrashing. “I’m gonna—I’m gonna leave you to it.”

~

The entire compound is compromised. Three of his cars are compromised. His fucking _phone_ becomes compromised, and at four in the afternoon all of his contacts switch over to _STANK INTERN_ , which makes him suspect Rhodey as an accomplice. 

He nearly eats soap. There’s some kind of garden growing in his desktop keyboard. There are two birds setting up shop in the garage.

Tony gets into the car. The one that Peter didn’t get to. He’s beyond fuming. He’s a man on a mission. He’s gonna kill Spiderman. He never thought he’d actually have those thoughts, but no one—no one—has ever gotten the upper hand on him like this. He speeds over to the Parker residence and hopes May isn’t home to see this. He doesn’t know what the hell he’s gonna do but he’s gonna do _something_. It’ll come to him. And whatever it is, Peter is gonna deserve it. 

The drive takes forever and he thunders up the stairs on the way to Peter’s apartment, breathing heavily like a fucking ox or something, but his heart drops into his stomach when he sees Peter’s front door is open. It’s just a crack, but wide enough to see inside.

Tony stops, staring at it. It isn’t like Peter to leave it open, he’s really careful about shit like that, and all kinds of horrors flash through Tony’s mind, erasing any bad thoughts he’d been having a moment before. Fuck—anybody could be in there—they could have caught Peter by surprise, knocked him out with a pipe—it could have been some kind of super villain, like Toomes, looking for revenge on Spiderman. Someone who’d found out his identity. Fuck, his kid could be taken, he could be hurt—he could be dead.

Tony wishes he had a weapon but it’s too late for that now. He has to assess the situation, he has to find Peter. He slides up against the wall and quickly steps into the apartment, ready to fight if he needs to. The place is trashed—the curtains are torn down, the books from the bookcase are thrown around everywhere, the dining room table is overturned, a few glasses are broken on the ground. There’s an overturned cereal bowl, milk spilled on the ground. Peter’s backpack is there too, the contents tumbling out and everywhere.

Tony feels sick. His heart is hammering and he’s just about to tap on the housing unit to suit up when someone jumps out from behind him, shrieking at the top of their lungs. Tony yells too, out of surprise but not fear because he fucking knows that dumb idiot voice, knows it even more when Peter dissolves into laughter, collapsing on the ground at Tony’s feet.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Tony breathes, pinching the bridge of his nose as Peter keeps laughing. He sucks in a breath, quickly switching modes from panic to pissed. “I could have killed you.”

Peter is literally rolling around laughing and Tony shakes his head down at him.

“You’re the worst. The worst person I’ve ever known.”

“Oh my God,” Peter gasps, and tears are running down his cheeks. 

“You could have given me a heart attack,” Tony says, putting his hands on his hips. “You’ve been torturing me all day and then you try to kill me. I thought you cared, Parker, I thought I’d made an impact on your life, I thought you wanted to keep me around—”

“You jumped—so high—”

“I did not. I didn’t even—I didn’t even yell.”

“Yeah right,” Peter giggles.

Tony knows he yelled. He can still hear it echoing in his ears. His face goes hot and he crosses his arms over his chest, trying not to smile. Peter’s stupid laugh always makes him smile but he’s irritated right now, he doesn’t wanna fucking smile. He’s never gotten so goddamn owned in April Fools pranks before. He thinks about what Pepper said earlier. Underneath the boiling anger and the outer layer of glitter and flour, he is a little bit proud of Peter for winning this day so handily. He just wishes he wasn’t the victim. But yeah, the kid did good. Too good.

“Why the hell was I your target, huh?” Tony asks. “Couldn’t we have teamed up against Steve? I’ve had some great ideas for pranking Cap, lemme tell you—”

“This is revenge,” Peter says, still wheezing with laughter and staring up at him. “For the pink hair.”

Tony snorts just remembering it, and he is smiling now. “Now, that—that—”

“That lasted for a whole week!” Peter says, holding his hand out for Tony to help him up.

Tony smacks his hand away. “Did not, liar. Five days, maximum, I’m tired of your exaggerating—”

“Uh! I had to live with it! It was a week!” Peter points at him with purpose.

Tony narrows his eyes at him and grabs onto his wrist, yanking him up to his feet. Peter grins at him and Tony sees he’s got fake blood blotted around the corner of his mouth and a really badly made up bruise on his cheek. “You’re so stupid, is that makeup?” Tony asks, pressing his pointer finger into the brown and black, streaking it. “Did you buy makeup? Are you now in possession of Teddy Bear MAC eyeshadow? Yeah, I know my colors, and this one has glitter in it.”

“Ugh, really?” Peter asks, reaching up and smudging it. “I didn’t mean to use that one.”

“Did Pepper help you with all the shit at the compound? Rhodey? I need to know.”

“Tony—”

“A list of accomplice names,” Tony says, snapping his fingers. “Quickly. In alphabetical order, so I know how to arrange the payroll—”

“Nope.”

“I am changing every security code you have.”

“You’ll just give me the new ones next time I come over.”

“I won’t.”

“Yeah, sure,” Peter says, grinning. “Tell me that tomorrow for taco night.”

Tony glares at him. He looks around—there’s some kind of something on the wall that looks like it’s supposed to be blood, but it’s barely passing. There’s an entire pile of what looks like clean towels just strewn across the floor leading up to Peter’s bedroom. Tony laughs a little, looking around, his plan forming in his head. “You really did a number on this place, huh?” he asks.

“Yeah,” Peter says, sounding proud. “Wanted to make it look realistic. I wasn’t sure if I was gonna jump out or lay down in front of the door like I’d been knocked out or something, but I was starting to feel bad, so—”

“Oh, the evil mastermind felt bad?” Tony asks, raising his eyebrows. He gestures to the towels. “Those looked clean.”

“They were, I just knocked over the laundry bin.”

“I see, I see, okay,” Tony says, nodding, turning on the spot. “Broke some glass, too.”

“There’s more in the kitchen,” Peter says. “I wasn’t sure where you were gonna go. I tossed some leftover spaghetti onto the cabinet doors.”

“And the drapes took a hit,” Tony says, eyes tracing over the diagonal line of destruction. 

“Yup, yup,” Peter says, and he’s grinning even harder now. “Really freaked you out, huh?”

“Yep,” Tony says, meeting his eyes. “So you did all this—made it look like somebody broke in here, messed everything up—but you wound up just jumping out at me, you made me yell, yeah, yeah—but that was your prank. All this was for that.”

“Yeah!” Peter says.

“You coulda just…hid behind the door, jumped out, that woulda worked too,” Tony says.

Peter’s face falls a little bit. “Yeah, I guess.”

“So…you didn’t even need to trash your apartment for this to work,” Tony says. 

Peter stares at him. He looks a lot less confident now. “I…I guess not.”

“Thought so,” Tony says. He reaches into his pocket, pulling his phone out. “I’m just gonna give May a quick ring, tell her what you’ve been up to.”

Peter’s eyes go comically wide. “Tony _no!_ ” he yells, lunging for him. 

“Tony _yes_ ,” Tony says, and he’s lucky he’s overbearing and memorized her number because his phone is still fucked up from Peter’s previous prank. He moves out of Peter’s way and swiftly makes for the door as he dials, walking out into the hallway.

“Please please please!” Peter yells, chasing him.

“I’m not helping you clean up,” Tony says, the phone ringing, and he starts down the stairs, Peter toppling after him. “You made your bed, kid—or unmade it, I’m sure you wrecked your own room, too, you lunatic.”

“Mr. Stark! If you like me _at all_ —”

“Nope!” Tony says. “Won’t work—” He stops talking when he reaches May’s voicemail, and brushes Peter’s hand off his arm. The voicemail beeps. “Hey May, how you doing—just so you know your nephew destroyed your home in an effort to prank me for April Fools—alright, call me back, I’ll see you later.” He hangs up the phone and picks up the pace, laughing manically. 

“You’re the worst!” Peter yells, chasing him. “I’m dead now! You just signed my death warrant!”

“With _flourish!_ ” Tony yells over his shoulder. “Kid, I think you left your door open—better be careful, someone might break in—”

“Call her back and tell her you’re kidding!” Peter yells, as they reach the next landing, and Peter grabs his arm again. 

“Nope, nope,” Tony says, stopping and turning to face him. He pinches Peter’s cheek and laughs. “Look at that. Such sorrow. That was my face when I saw what you did to my Audi.”

“But—”

Peter’s phone rings. His eyes go wide and Tony has heard his ringtone for May enough to know it’s her calling him. He throws his head back and laughs, and proceeds rushing down the stairs, leaving Peter to his fate. “Good luck, Pete! See you on taco night!”


End file.
